by Will Mosley
She could not see, but she could smell and she knew what was in the basement. She took her phone from her pocket, prepared herself for the worst imaginable scene. Then, with a press of a button, ignited the device.
Only a dim glow stretched out from the phone, but it was enough. She saw maroon blood in clotted pools like thin mud, those limp, grayed limbs, those blank, cheek drawn faces frozen in an eternal lament, behind which a soul once resided, but had since fled. She no longer felt like the instrument of war that she was trained to be. The lever must have flipped because she felt intensely human – like a little girl, in fact, and running from this basement screaming incoherently was on her sort list of 'things to do as she ran up the stairs'.
She didn't have to see or smell anything else to know that Jean was unequivocally correct in her observation. She had to get out of the basement, had call the police! Fuck Whitewash, fuck Project Trojan and the transmission! The phone automatically dimmed and she tapped the screen once more to keep it alive. This time when the light shone, the battery meter read 1%, and a message across the screen read: Connect your phone to the charger! There was no time for that. She stuck the phone into the black space ahead of her as a torch, took two steps up the stairs and stopped. On the fifth stair up from the basement floor laid a yellow post-it note and there were words on it written by a sloppy hand. Heather took it, held it to her face with the phone beside it. It read:
You are not well and I know how to fix your problem. I know who you are and I know why you're here. These are issues that I can correct. Starbucks in town, tomorrow, 0900. -H
The message was strange and vague, but not enough to slow her leaving, from calling the police, or at least Lucus. Lucus! Call him! Call him! her mind urged as she slowly moved upward on the stairs, approaching the basement's door. But at that moment, a new understanding stoked her fear as she heard the low rumble of the of a heavy glass door sliding open.
It came without warning, as she would have expected to hear footsteps on the wooden porch outside, a laughing voice, even a shout from across the road that someone was here. Her body froze with her hand extended toward the door knob, fingers lightly grazing its cold, slick brass. She needed to be soundless. Bursting through the basement door and surprising the home's occupant could only end poorly, if he were also armed.
The sound of heavy boots plodded through the kitchen, then stopped. Did he hear me?
“Damn!” The man said through a grizzled voice suited for a long time smoker. “That was strong. Something's changed.” He hadn't heard her, but maybe she hadn't closed the glass door completely, maybe she left footprints, maybe –, “Someone's here.” He spoke the words not like he believed that someone could've come in, but as if he knew.
Heather could not, would not move until he was far enough away from the door for her to make the call. But she had already placed her phone on silent mode, so when she dialed Lucus, the occupant wouldn't hear the key tone. She slowly lifted her hand to the phone and keened her ears, listening to the occupant's footsteps slowly moving across the kitchen and into the living room as if he were stalking something. His steps came to a thumping halt. Then, he lifted something from the floor and the cocking of a pump action shotgun startled her. The footsteps sounded distant now, on the other end of the house. She typed in Lucus’s number. Maybe he's back home now. She thought. After seconds of digital switchboard connecting clicks, the call went through. Holding steady, bracing herself on the handrail, waiting for Lucus to answer – or that pathetic voice mail message to come on so that she could immediately hang up and try again before the phone died completely, she whispered, “Come on, Lucus. Be there!”
Behind her, below her, somewhere in that black catacomb of hell where up turned eyes and twisted bodies silently screaming for redemption, where no living thing could reside, a cell phone rang.
Terror stretched through her muscles burning like frost bite, her mind receiving input – facts, a new realization – yet, rejecting it, frantically sifting through alternatives. Someone stole his phone. Someone robbed his house, now that person is down here. Someone found the phone and –. It rang again. Then, in the living room, the footsteps stopped.
“Oh god!” She whispered, straining to stiffen her body and move down the stairs in silence. She quietly placed each foot on each stair, then leaning her body weight on that leg and repeated the movement, but soon, the boots slammed against the floor, rushing toward the basement door. The phone rang again. Finally, her foot was on the concrete floor, concrete didn't squeak and she quickly bolted to into the darkness, rapidly tapping her finger on the end button she whispered, “Stop calling you stupid thing!”
Into a soft mound of writhed skin she slammed, her phone nearly slipping away in the contact, as the basement door flung open. She needed to remain motionless, absolutely breathless, but in the heap of bodies she could feel prodding, lifeless fingers caressing her ass, kneading her as her tiny movements imparted to them post-mordial life.
When the door flung open, she expected blinding light to illuminate the basement, but that did not happen. A phantom, the man stood at the top stair, a slight luminescence surrounded him; his gaze, like Satan casting perverted judgment over a vast kingdom of illogical chaos.
He sniffed the air, his inhalation ripped molecules apart, “I smell pussy.” He said, slamming the door behind him and beginning down the stairs, dropping his boots – his body weight – on each descending step as if he were jumping on them. Still sniffing, the basement midnight black, she heard the plodding boots drop to the concrete floor and move away from her into a far corner.
Still, no light. Not even a flashlight. She figured that once he arrived on the bottom step, he'd flip the light switch, turn to her and open fire. Or, that at some moment, he'd turn a flashlight on and swing that accusatory beam at her. Neither of those things happened, and though the opportunity to strike while his back was turned was great, simply reaching for her gun would alert him that there was life in the basement besides him and firing blindly into the dark – albeit in his direction – was the deed of an amateur.
“He must've left his cell phone on,” he said and began sifting through bodies, throwing them against a wall as if he could see them, as if they were bags of garbage. “Don't you think?”
The question startled her. It was far to dark for her to see anything, let alone for him to see her against a stack of human carcasses, yet, he seemed to walk directly over to the bodies as if he could see and questioned the darkness expecting an answer. So who is he talking to? She assumed that someone who could create the insanity around her was not of sound mind and could only be talking to the dead. Suddenly, he stopped tossing the bodies and Heather felt his gaze upon her.
“You gone answer me, or what?” He said. Saying anything would be foolish and would give away her position. She would allow him to live in his deluded world until she could escape.
“Fuck it, then.” He said and continued to move through the bodies. “You know this is all your fault, right?” She remained silent. “All this... all these damn stinking bodies. It's all on your head. Not mine. I'm not answering for this. I didn't do this to myself, you know? I said to myself, 'when I figure out what happened to me, I'm gone kill them all.' Now, I – I just don't know anymore and I don't see no way outta this. This is fucked up and you know I can't be messed up in the head that bad if I can recognize it. Just so you know, I was fucked up – was – thinking that all these women were you. You know why I came here. I can feel it, you know, and I can't explain that. The others are going to be coming soon because they can feel it – they can feel you.” There was a long silence. Then, he stopped shuffling through the bodies. “Will you please answer my questions and stop making a fool of me?”
She said nothing and peered into the blackness not able to see anything, but recognized the voice as if it were her own played back as a recording. If the voice belonged to the man's image she was now thinking about, and unless she performed so
me miracle of gun work and agility while blind, escape from this dungeon now proved to be impossible. The anticipation of interaction became palpable as long moments of silence lingered in the blackness. From her mouth, with the normalcy of an exhalation, came: “It's not your fault.”
For seconds, the silence between them was thick and neither of them made any attempt to move toward the other; both aware, both repeating the last spoken phrase in their heads – one as confirmation, the other as a mistake. Suddenly, movement commenced and with the sound of bags of wet sand being thrown about, the man spoke: “Sorry about your friend, but I see now I was right about him. He came by here early this morning and I thought he was... it'll sound stupid if I say it, so I won't. But I cut the little bastard up. I came out a little later and saw a note that he left and I was walking to that Starbucks like the note said, but halfway there I knew you weren't going to be there. It's good to hear your voice, Heather. It's good to hear somebody confirm that I'm not crazy after all.”
A whirling jacket whispered through the air, the tiny clanking of intricate metallic machinery followed and through the blackness, like a camera flash blinding her, the shotgun exploded.
Chapter 26.
The gun play, the loud vulgarities from the red bearded man and his blue eyed accomplice reduced Lainy to a curled ball of tears and soft sobs, whom her mother could not comfort.
“Is the phone ringing, fat man?” Greg jammed the Glock into Lee's neck.
“It is.” Lee said coolly.
“If you're lying, I'll empty your head.” Lee nodded.
“Did you get it right, Lee? Did you dial it right?” Judith sat on the coach between Ken and Mary.
“I did, Jude, but he's not answering.”
“Well, he'd better.” Greg muttered in Lee's ear. He licked his lips, bit down on them and shoved Lee's head with the point of the gun.
“Hey! Come on!” Lee yelled.
“Or else what?”
“You made your point, friend! I know that you have the gun, alright?”
To anyone with no knowledge of Greg Hart, the look in his eyes meant that he understood. Ben, sitting in Lee's stink chair, knew that look and only turned his head. Greg lowered the gun to his waist. Suddenly, he whipped it across his body and cracked Lee in the face, which sent him careening into Ben's lap. Judith screamed and Greg's gun turned to her. Ken's veins pumped magma. Blood gushed from a wound under Lee's eyes and above his nose, and oozed from his cheeks.
“What the hell?” Ben shoved Lee's hobbled body to the floor. “... Getting blood all over me and shit!”
Greg turned the gun from Judith to Ken. “You want some? I got something for you, too.” Ken said nothing. Greg took the cell phone, which he'd taken from Ken earlier, from the floor, grabbed Lee's collar, stood him up and slammed the phone against his ear. “You ain't done here. I want that bastard over here, now!”
Lee stumbled and leaned his head over to allow the blood to drip to the floor, but only succeeded in covering the front of his shirt in red smears. “Okay... okay,” he forced out.
Judith covered her mouth with her hands in horror and tears slithered into the nooks between her fingers. For a second she lowered them. “Lee! Honey!”
“I'b oright,” Lee mumbled without the aid of his nasal passage to add treble to his voice. “It's – it's just blood, Jude.”
“Call!” Greg yelled.
“Boicebail.” Lee huffed softly.
“Shit!” Greg took the phone, listened for a moment and hung up. “Listen, all of you.” Greg slung the gun in a circle as if it were merely a laser pointer. “If anyone says a word while he's talking,” Greg looked on the floor to Lainy, revved his leg back and kicked her squarely in the small of her back. Lainy wretched in agony – her mouth agape and tears pouring down her cheeks, but the sheer traumatizing terror would not allow sound to pass her lips – only nasal whimpers.
“What the hell are you doing?” Ken jumped up from the sofa. Ben rose with him and placed his gun barrel between his eyes. Ken froze.
“No, Ben.” Greg smiled. “Let'em come at me. I'll eat his ass for lunch.”
“This is between you and my brother, sir.” Ken quailed his anger, but his eyes burned through Greg. “Just don't involve us – my child especially – in this.”
“As far as I'm concerned, you faggots got the same blood. And he done already took one of mine, so everybody here is game.” Greg approached Ken and locked eyes with him. “You do some stupid shit like that when dad's on the phone with him and I won't kill the girl,” A crooked, esurient smile poured onto his face as if it were gently kneaded into shape. “I'll take her with us for a few ... pleasurable days.”
Ken's rage bubbled underneath the surface of his skin, but he wasted no time taking his seat.
“Good boy.” Greg said. He redialed the number, palmed the phone and slapped it against Lee's ear as it started ringing. “Call!”
Chapter 27.
Marilyn Monroe. Bright red lips, bleached and flared locks of golden hair nestled her shoulders. From a pivot mounted in her torso rotated three thin, elongated rectangles. The slimmest of the rectangles, circularly swept around Marilyn once every minute. Laying on the floor, Tanner had watched it pass her lovely face no less than thirty times and still could not detect movement from the other two thin rectangles. On Marilyn's right side was the number '9'. To her left, was a '3'. She sat atop a large '6' allowing her leg to dangle over and lure onlookers, and above her was the number '12'. The short, fat rectangle now pointed toward the 9.
When he emerged from an almost comatose slumber, his muscles were pudding and his blinks were slow. But there was Marilyn, sitting vibrantly as though she were immortal, mentally prodding Tanner to get up.
“She's... just... a clock.” He whispered. “A clock whose time –,” Instantly awake, Tanner sprung from the floor, only now feeling the pain in his ribs that the laptop had caused, and sprinted to the clock. “9:15! Dammit!”
He grabbed his jacket and rushed up the stairs. Halfway up, he heard the faint ringing of a telephone. He burst through the door – at which time the phone's ringing had stopped – and headed for the living room. When he opened the front door and pushed open the glass storm door, the phone started ringing again.
With one hand holding the storm door and the other on the knob of the front door, Tanner stopped and he didn't know why. The ringing seemed to be targeted, as if the caller had specifically wanted to speak with him. Nonsense, he thought. However, he remained motionless.
After the phone rang four times, it stopped. Tanner waited for no more than a moment, then slowly pulled the front door closed. Before it latched, the phone began to ring.
Tanner closing both doors, stepped back into the living room, and marched upstairs. He didn't know where the phone was, but when he reached the second floor hallway, he sensed the ringing coming from the furthest back bedroom.
In the bedroom, he stood over the phone and watched it ring. Somehow he knew that whoever was on the other end had something of great importance to impart, but what, and who?
The phone stopped ringing again. He waited for its internal bell to begin again, but it didn't. Ten seconds ticked away and nothing. Fifteen seconds. Twenty –, it started again. This time Tanner snatched the phone from its base.
“Hello?” He gently spoke.
“Tadder? Is that you?” The voice said.
Tanner sighed in relief. “Hey, dad! I'm so sorry I'm late getting over –,”
“Hey, don't worry about that, son. It's dot impordant. Listen, I need you to cob on ober just as soon as you can, okay?”
“Sure, dad. I'm headed there now. Your voice... You're mispronouncing words. You don't sound like yourself.”
“I'b fine, son. I seem to be cobbing down with a liddle cold, that's all. Oh, and bring that degree with you. I'd like to see it.”
Degree? But he knows I didn't graduate! “What are you talking about, dad? I told you I didn't –,”
“If you could clue me in as to what you're –,” Tanner said, but the phone line was dead.
Tanner stared into the phone's handset until the busy signal began alerting him to put the receiver down. That simple process wasn't as easy as he'd hoped because he somehow wanted to obtain more information from his father, over this handset, and felt that if he continued to hold it, maybe something more useful than the old man's nonsense would come forth. Instead, only a moment later, an automated voice began asking him,
“If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and try again. If you –,”
Tanner placed the receiver on the hook. “A degree?” He asked himself. “He knows I don't have a degree. I told him that. What is he talking about?”
Asking questions to the walls was fruitless and a brisk walk to the other Garay house would give him some clarification. If he needed to come back to Ken's house to retrieve whatever Lee was talking about, it would only be a short walk back.
Tanner left the house and tripled checked the door knob. Because he didn't have a key, and he'd most likely return in a matter of minutes, he quickly scanned the neighborhood with an eye out for meandering teens and closed the front door, intentionally leaving it unlocked.
An uncommonly strong night breeze blew cool air through Tanner's hair and clothes, and he cinched his jacket when he walked into the driveway of 280 Grand Harbor. He hesitated for a moment at the bumper of Ken's police cruiser, but continued toward the house, when he realized that the chill that riddled his arms and neck with goose flesh came not from the ambient air, but cooled him from within, tingled him with a strange curiosity of imagination – or vivid foreknowledge.